ht air or into the library,
where with the mere mechanical instinct of a student he picked up a
book, reading a few lines in it, then throwing it aside. Yet wherever
he was he felt her sufferings as acutely as when standing by her side.
His whole frame was in keenest sympathy with hers, his whole being
full of pain. So sharp were his sensations that they imparted an
abnormal vigor to his mind. Every line his eyes met in reading stood
out on the page with wonderful distinctness. The words seemed
pictorial, and his mind grasped abstruse propositions or involved
expressions with marvellous facility.

He noted it, and remembered afterward that he thought at the time how
curious it was that his tortured sympathies should give him such
startling acuteness of perception.

The slow night waned, the slow dawn crept over the eastern hills.
Cecil stood with haggard eyes at the foot of the bed, watching the
sleeper's face. As the daylight brightened, blending with the light of
the still burning lamps, he saw a change come over her countenance;
the set face relaxed, the look lost its wildness. A great hope shone
in his hollow eyes.

"She is getting better, she is coming out of her sufferings," he
whispered to the doctor.

"She will be out of her sufferings very soon," he replied sadly; and
then Cecil knew that the end was at hand. Was it because the peace,
the profound serenity which sometimes is the prelude of death, filling
her being, penetrated his, that he grew so strangely calm? An
inexpressible solemnity came to him as he looked at her, and all his
agitation left him.

Her face grew very sweet and calm, and full of peace. Her eyes met
Cecil's, and there was in them something that seemed to thank him for
all his goodness and patience,--something that was both benediction
and farewell. Her lips moved, but she was past the power of speech,
and only her eyes thanked him in a tender, grateful glance.

The sun's edge flashed above the horizon, and its first rays fell
through the uncurtained window full upon her face. She turned toward
them, smiling faintly, and her face grew tenderly, radiantly
beautiful, as if on that beam of sunshine the spirit of her dead lover
had come to greet her from the sea. Then the sparkle died out of her
eyes and the smile faded from her lips. It was only a white, dead face
that lay there bathed in golden light.

A moment after, Cecil left the house with swift footsteps and plunged
into the adja